So I'm not looking for answers or spells handed to me, but I wanted to pick your brain about an idea I saw floating around Tumblr of carrying an enchanted key as a personal ward. I have a very pretty key that doesn't actually go to anything, and I was curious what links your mind finds between keys and wards.
I think it’s awesome. Totally do it.
Keys are great - there’s a lot of symbolism behind keys. The most obvious is opening/closing: you can use a key to open a door or to lock it shut, which can also be applied to a range of dichotomies (for example, broadly -- winter/summer, night/day, narrower -- binding/freeing and the previously mentioned opening/shutting).
Keys are also very representative of knowledge and of access -- in short, power.
I would even argue that keys could be very useful for crossing liminal spaces, but that’s neither here nor there.
I’m ruminating on a protection water that hinges on an iron key, so I do think very highly of keys in protection magic.
With warding -- especially if you’re warding something or someone transient -- it can be a smart idea to tie the wards to an object rather than, say, a house. If you rent, you have to unravel your wards when you move if you tie the wards to the apartment. And it’s a rather large undertaking to even set up wards on a home or a property in the first place. But if your wards are tied to a smaller object, you just pick up the object and take it with you.
And then you have the added bonus of your object being a key, so you get that layer of symbolism added to your wards. Ugh, it’s all so good.
Wards keyed (ha) into a key; I think it’s a great idea.
